Let me start by saying I was a Hulk booster. In the interminable argument about who was more potent, I always sided with the Hulk and eventually so did Marvel. Ben Grimm, the Thing was touted as being the more savvy fighter and that made their periodic clashes always interesting.
The Thing didn't really trip my trigger when I was stripling Marvel zombie. I didn't grok his greatness.
But I was wrong. As I matured, the awesomeness of the Thing began to sink in and I started to get the tragic nature of Ben Grimm, his isolation and the despair he had despite his enormous celebrity and enormous strength.
The Thing is now among my favorite Marvel heroes (right up there with Hawkeye and Captain Mar-Vell) and that's an assessment which has stood the test of time.
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I remember Lee writing Ben Grimm as a tortured soul and in constant struggle with his "power" and his human side -- which is pretty deep for a comic character in those days. The irony of the blind Alicia as his girlfriend added a touch that was perfect (a clever use of the "love is blind" adage).
ReplyDeleteGreat point about Alicia. There was something operatic about Ben Grimm's situation and Alicia fits right in.
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The difference is that, even confronted by his limitations against the Hulk or the cosmic-powered Dr. Doom, the Thing never gave up.
ReplyDeleteAnd that's what won me over eventually. To be frank, I never could really figure out what the rock hide was all about but when I got a sense of that, his essence came through. His humor is almost always of the gallows variety which blends a light tone with dark times.
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